


At Times We Live Alone

by orphan_account



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Gay Thomas Jefferson, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pansexual Alexander Hamilton, Rating May Change, Social Anxiety, Trans Thomas Jefferson, pretty much all of them are queer
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-29
Updated: 2017-09-29
Packaged: 2019-01-06 15:32:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12213708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Thomas' experience of uni has been excessively lonely so far. His best friend is hours away, and social anxiety has kept him from making any new friends. Then he meets Alexander. Maybe their interaction is solely restricted to arguing, but Thomas will take what he can get.





	At Times We Live Alone

**Author's Note:**

> Heyo, Timian here! I'm pretty sure everyone in the fandom is well aware of this, but real life Jefferson was a mega jerk. musical tjeffs is based on the real person, yeah, but he's a fictional character. I just wanted to make sure no one thinks i'm trying to redeem the irl guy (fuck him)
> 
> this thing started out as a vent fic about my own experience of uni, so if it seems really angsty in the beginning that's why hahaa
> 
> The title is from Sondre Lerche's song by the same name, but the song has nothing to do with this fic (Sondre Lerche is great, though)

Thomas Jefferson was lonely. It had been almost three months since he started uni, and things were depressingly similar to how they had been back then. His best friend was still several hours away. His other friends – well, maybe if he actually had any other friends the situation would be different.

He was currently holed up in his apartment, the way he had been since his lecture ended seven hours ago, drinking his third cup of tea and trying to focus on his book. He had worked out yesterday. He was ahead in all his subjects. He had long since finished all the good shows on Netflix. It was really important to Thomas to be able to focus on this book, because it was the only thing left to distract him from how miserable he was.

No good. Sighing, Thomas put the book down and picked up his phone. There were some tumblr notifications and two new messages from James.

**Jemmy** [21:09]: I understand why maths are a necessary part of this course, but also, I just wanted to learn about plants.  
**Jemmy** [21:09]: Anyway, how are you?

Frowning at the screen, Thomas considered how he could respond without worrying James.

**You** [21:17]: you knew this when you decided to apply for a biology course literally three light years away from me  
**You** [21:18]: and im fine  
**Jemmy** [21:18]: It’s less than 4oo miles.  
**Jemmy** [21:18]: Are you sure?  
**You** [21:25]: yes  
**Jemmy** [21:25]: You took a long time to respond to that.  
**You** [21:26]: urgh  
**You** [21:26]: it’s just the same as usual ok  
**You** [21:26]: I miss you

Thomas watched the three dots appear and disappear several times before James replied.

**Jemmy** [21:28]: Do you want me to call you?  
**You** [21:28]: …yes

His phone started vibrating immediately. Feeling guilty already (why couldn’t he have been just a little more convincing?) he answered the call with a “Hey.”

“Hi,” James responded, and then they fell silent. Thomas listened to James’ steady breathing and told himself not to bother his friend with his whining. His resolve lasted all of seven seconds.

“I don’t know what to do, James! I’m so tired of being alone all the time, but I don’t know how I’m supposed to make friends when I can’t even talk to people.”

Thomas could hear his voice quivering already, and dammit, he hadn’t meant for this to be one of those nights.

“Have you tried talking to anyone in your course yet?”

“How would I do that?” he asked, sounding just a little bit more resigned than he intended to. “We only see each other in lectures, and no one comes there to do small talk with the pathetic guy who always sits alone.”

He heard James breathe in a couple of times as if he was about to say something but changed his mind at the last second.

“You’re such a good person, Tommy. You’re a great friend, and I wish I could do something to help them see that.”

“I’m not, though. A great friend. Hell, I’m not even a good friend! I bother you with my problems all the time, and now I’ve made you feel bad as well! You have other friends, I shouldn’t take up so much of your time when you could be having fun with them instead.”

“You’re right. I do have other friends. But none of them are my best friend, Thomas.”

At that, Thomas began to cry. “I’m sorry,” he whispered, trying to keep his sniffles to a minimum.

“Don’t be,” James replied, and he sounded like he meant it, he always did.

“I miss you.”

“I know. I miss you too.”

James stayed on the phone with him until he was done crying and feeling a little better, and then he talked about his classes for a while. James loved biology. His classes were a little tiring, he said, but he sounded happy, and Thomas couldn’t find it in himself to blame him for choosing to go somewhere that he couldn’t follow.

They said goodnight, and then he was alone again.

 

* * *

 

Thomas woke up the next morning feeling like a wreck. A quick glance in the mirror as he was brushing his teeth confirmed that his eyes were swollen and red around the edges. His hair was somehow even messier than it normally was in the mornings. Oh well, he had performed miracles before and he could do it again. After a cold shower (James refused to accept his claims that it was healthy, but he didn’t let that stop him), breakfast and a cup of tea, he felt almost ready to face the day.

Finding a seat at lectures was never fun when you didn’t know anybody. He tended to get there early just so he wouldn’t have to ask anyone if he could sit next to them. Today was no exception, and when he sat down at the very end of a row of seats, the auditorium was still almost empty.

It only took a few minutes, though, for the room to start filling up with students. Thomas sighed in relief when a short guy with a ponytail sat down on the seat to his left - he hated when he ended up with an empty seat next to him. It made it so obvious that no one here liked him and it was fucking embarrassing. He turned his focus to his bag, retrieving his laptop and water bottle, and didn’t think anything of it when he heard the guy next to him start speaking.

“Professor Lee is such a jerk, don’t you agree?” A friend of his must have sat down next to him, then.

Silence.

Thomas set his laptop down on the desk in front of him and sneaked a look to his left, only to startle as he was met with ponytail guy’s expectant gaze. A girl had sat down next to him, but she was talking to her friend and didn’t seem to notice or care about the two of them at all. Had he been talking to Thomas, then?

Thomas swallowed. “Were you talking to me?”

“Uh, yeah? Who else would I be talking to?”

“Oh. Well. Uhm. What was… what was the question again?”

“Nothing really, I was just looking to reaffirm my own opinion that Lee is a useless bag of dicks, but I already know that I’m right so I suppose the question was redundant.”

He had no idea how to respond to that. Ponytail guy waited for a few seconds for him to say something, but seemed to take it in stride when he didn’t. “I’m Alexander,” he said, reaching out a hand that Thomas accepted hesitantly.

“Nice to meet you,” he replied. Alexander’s hand was smaller than his own, but his fingers were thicker than Thomas’ long, dainty ones. Perfect for playing the piano, his mother had once told him. He still played piano, but his mother didn’t think anything about him was perfect anymore.

There was another pause.

“And your name is…?”

This was why he didn’t have any friends. This was why he avoided social interaction and why he sat alone in lectures and why he only ever talked to James who was safe and familiar and patient. Realistically, Thomas knew this was just a tiny mistake that he could have laughed off, haha, I forgot to give you my name, how stupid right – easy. It wasn’t, though. Thomas felt the sudden but familiar need to go hide in his room for the rest of the day so no one could see how awkward and embarrassing he was.

It wasn’t an option this time, though, was it? So he looked away, turned his head towards the front of the room where the professor was just getting ready to start, told himself that if he couldn’t see the other student looking at him like he was an idiot then it didn’t matter.

He couldn’t find the confidence to make a joke out of it. “Thomas,” was all that left his mouth. Then he bit his cheek and tried not to visibly cringe. Stupid.

Alexander didn’t say anything more to him after that. The lecture started.

 

* * *

 

It was a really long lecture. In the literal sense, yes – 90 minutes was way too long for anyone to listen to one self-absorbed asshole talk about one subject – but mostly in that Thomas hadn’t dared move at all throughout the entirety of it, too afraid to accidentally turn his head catch Alexander judging him. If he was, well, he would rather not know. And if he wasn’t? Better not to draw attention to himself by fidgeting.

90-minute lectures were generally accepted to be synonymous with torture, so they always had a break in the middle. Thomas had been hoping that Alexander would get up during the break so he could relax for a moment, but no such luck. The boy remained seated. A continuous _tap-tap_ told him that he was writing, and quickly. Maybe he wouldn’t try to start a conversation, then. Small mercies.

He finally risked a look at his neighbor, figuring he would be too busy with whatever he was working on to notice, but when he turned his head towards him Alexander immediately looked up from his computer.

“I’m writing a contribution to the school paper about Lee’s biased and morally skewed presentation of psychology in the 1800s. I mean, did you hear the way he talked about hysteria as if there was actually anything wrong at all with those women other than being oppressed by the society they lived in? The diagnosis was literally named after the uterus, of course it’s rooted in misogyny! Even today women are still called hysterical whenever they act emotional or upset, and this dickface has the audacity to joke about the women of that time being _weak_. So, George Taylor claimed a quarter of all women suffered from hysteria? Maybe that says more about him than it does about them.”

“Are you angry at Lee or the 19th century?” Thomas said, instantly regretting it. Fuck, why was he trying to be funny? That never turned out well, never ever. His words were usually so carefully considered, but sometimes things just slipped out without his consent.

“Both,” Alexander replied immediately, matter-of-fact and with no hesitation.

Well, he didn’t seem to hate him. Thomas had already started talking, might as well keep going now. “I mean, I don’t disagree with you, but is it really such a big deal? It was just a comment, it’s not like it had any important impact on the content of the lecture.”

The typing stopped. Thomas admittedly had a tendency to assume the worst, but he swore he could almost feel the other student’s attitude towards him change.

“So you’re saying you don’t mind that our professor is a blatant misogynist?”

He immediately understood why Alexander had interpreted him like that, because words were apparently not on his side today. What Thomas had been trying to say was that having an opinion and _vocalizing_ an opinion were two very different things, that baring yourself to the criticism of the entire student body – no matter that the majority was likely to agree with you – seemed scary and emotionally exhausting. What he had been saying was that he never would have dared to do it.

“That’s not- “

“This is hardly the first time he has made comments like this, you know. Or maybe you don’t know, maybe you didn’t even notice! It doesn’t affect you, so why should you care, right?”

Thomas suddenly didn’t want to be having this conversation anymore. His chest was tight with anxiety, and simmering underneath was indignation at having this stranger put words in his mouth, making assumptions about him. _But_ , a small part of him that was a bit more forgiving whispered, and was promptly ignored, _he doesn’t know, there’s no way he could have known_.

He found himself not caring the least bit about Alexander’s opinion of him anymore. It felt almost liberating, in a way. “You know I never said that. Where do you get off making assumptions about me and my opinions? You don’t fucking know me at all.”

Alexander raised his eyebrows at his sudden outspokenness. As he made to reply, he looked almost regretful, but Thomas was too worked up to notice or care. He was distantly aware of Lee starting up the lecture again. He couldn’t find it in himself to care about that either.

“You’re right, I was a bit- “

“A bit like Lee.” It had been a long time since Thomas had allowed himself to get angry. Something ugly and wicked was rising in him. “Barely sparing people a glance before passing judgement, putting them in categories when you don’t know them, thinking yourself better than them. Well, fuck you.”

If Alexander had looked a bit surprised earlier, now he looked absolutely taken aback. For the first time since Thomas had met him (only 45 minutes ago, but still), he seemed at a loss for words.

“What?” he eventually managed.

“I said fuck you!” Thomas repeated - a bit too loudly, as it turned out. Lee had paused at just the wrong moment, and was now looking directly at the two of them. “Well,” he smirked. “If it isn’t Hamilton causing a scene again. I can’t say I’m surprised. And you, afro guy,”

Why did he have to _point_? Thomas shrank in on himself, broad shoulders and big hair but trying in vain to make himself smaller nonetheless. Everyone was looking at him now. _Everyone_ , and they were, oh god, how many? Two hundred? Three hundred?

“I think the two of you should leave. We wouldn’t want your lively discussion to be hindered by such a silly thing as education, after all.”

Alexander was already packing the numerous writing utensils and notebooks he had spread out before him with an angry frown on his face. Numbly, Thomas did the same. This was the worst things that had ever happened to him. Was everyone going to laugh at him after he had left? He was pretty sure someone already was. And there was a lot of whispering. Where they talking about him? What were they saying?

He almost didn’t notice that Alexander was leaving, but when he did, he quickly got up and followed him outside. Maybe he didn’t get along with the guy, but he would rather die than cross the entire room alone while everyone watched. As soon as the door closed behind them, Alexander was speed walking down the hall without sparing him so much as a glance.

Okay, so maybe the lecture hadn’t been that long after all.

**Author's Note:**

> someone please teach these boys to de-escalate
> 
> fun fact: hysteria is named after the greek word _hystera_ meaning "uterus", because people (read: men) used to think hysteria was caused by a woman's uterus _literally wandering around in her body_ like what the fuck
> 
> I'm hoping to continue this?? I'm not used to writing anything longer than 2k, though, so we'll see how long my resolve lasts :^)
> 
> also!! i don't know anything about uni in the us!! i'm from norway, so i'm basing the structure of the course and the lectures on my own experiences (but not anything else, because,, uni is free of charge in norway and it is Not in usa) (are the two education systems significantly different?? probably). tjeffs and a.ham are both taking a one-year psychology programme, by the way. i was gonna have them small talk about that before they started arguing, but things got Out Of Hand. 
> 
> i feel like i was planning to write something more here??? but now i can't remember. anyway, i hope you liked it, and thanks for reading! it's 2 am i'm going to bed bye


End file.
